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Toyota 'Down but not out'

by Derren McAlpine
(England)

I disagree with what people are saying about Toyota's quality image being finished.Yes they have had to recall a large amount of vehicles of all different models but I believe this will make Toyota a stronger company to come in the future as they will learn quickly by these mistakes.

thing I do agree on with other people is I wonder how their quality culture slipped so much to allow these problems to happen.

Is it over engineering of their models, a breakdown in the supply management chain, too much reliance on suppliers designing components or just not having the right team in place?

Again this problem just highlights the problems of Lean six sigma which in my opinion has taken a step too far in terms of quality culture (I have been involved with both six sigma and lean six sigma programmes within the automoyive area for years now and find it more of a hindrance to quality and manufacturing that helping these areas to become better as a company can become too lean and thus have major manufacturing problems occuring)

One thing is for sure this problem will also show other car makers that they should not sit on their laurels when designing and building cars and that quality plays a bigger part now than ever especially with new technology changing daily.

Comments for Toyota 'Down but not out'

Well since I posted my origional comment, I spoke to Toyota people. Its not a big job to do the repair and it does not cost much.

Here comes the if or but, Toyota has the oportunity to position themselves even better,if Toyota takes this on positive, with more enthusiasm and effort that anything they have ever done before, and be clever with their marketing/media releases.

The tide can turn for them.But, remember the other manufacturers will also take up arms.